Corpus Christi Indeed

Yesterday, I walked the Corpus Christi procession through the streets of Durham, sweat beading at my temples, my skirt clinging to my legs in the relentless 32°C heat and 92% humidity. It was the kind of weather that dares you to remain upright, let alone devout. And yet—there we were, a strange, beautiful river of bodies winding through the streets, hearts lifted as one in this most archaic of rituals.

Children, bright as springtime, moved ahead of us, strewing rose petals and the last peonies of the season before the Blessed Sacrament. Petals on hot pavement, tender offerings on the road of the Real Presence. Behind them, the altar boys bore tall candlesticks and the crucifix with quiet, solemn pride. And at the center of it all—our priest, heavy with vestments, bearing the golden monstrance under the embroidered canopy, carrying Christ Himself, Body and Blood, into the heart and the heat of the city.

It brought to mind Pope Leo XIII, just hours earlier, making the same holy walk through Rome—from the Lateran to the Basilica of Saint Mary Major—bearing the Host high above the ancient cobblestones. I walked those same streets a month ago. On pilgrimage. Through Holy Doors. Then, as now, the procession turns the public square into a temple, the ordinary street into a road to Emmaus.

Just ahead of me, two elderly women walked arm in arm, their heads bowed not in exhaustion but reverence. Every few steps they seemed to lean on one another more heavily, the heat pressing down on brittle bones. When we paused at a shaded altar adorned with lilies and lace, I leaned in and whispered, “You made it.” The nearer woman turned to me, eyes lit with something more than sweat and age. “Christ walked His Passion,” she said, matter-of-fact and luminous. “This is the least I can do.”

And I believed her.

Children clutched dripping freezie pops as we moved again, little tongues stained blue and red, hands sticky with sugar and devotion. We passed front yards where neighbours stood quietly, watching with equal parts curiosity and reverence. On the street, some cars whizzed past with curious gaze and some stopped as if witnessing something worth stopping for. We sang. We prayed. We stopped again and again at shaded altars where incense rose and the monstrance was lifted high.

And beside me—my husband, not Catholic, but walking with me all the same. A quiet witness, a companion in the mystery. No need for words between us, just the rhythm of shared steps. It felt good to have him at my side. We held hands.

This ritual, this strange and ancient act, is older than memory. And yet it came alive again, not just in the streets of Durham, but in me. In the slow rekindling of my faith, in the way this Body of Christ—broken, carried, adored—made its way back into my bones. I was raised on these rituals, but I’m learning to meet them anew, not with nostalgia, but with desire. With hunger. With a body that knows something sacred when it walks beside it.

We ended in the air-conditioned church hall, the smell of potluck and the soft collapse of laughter echoing off linoleum. Someone passed me a cold beer, and I enjoyed it alongside a paper plate piled with salads, sharp cheese, and a sliver of something sweet. We shared stories and laughter and community.

And somehow it was all Eucharist.

Corpus Christi. The Body of Christ.

Indeed.